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 Those and other mysteries were unraveled by dozens of African
storytellers in Nairobi on Saturday, helping keep alive oral
traditions increasingly under threat in the internet and
smartphone age.
"To have that storyteller in front of you with an audience being
able to interact is something very precious that we are in
danger of losing," said Maimouna Jallow, who organized the
one-day Re-Imagined Storytelling Festival in Kenya's capital.
Although written history has existed for centuries in West
Africa, elsewhere on the continent knowledge and morality have
mostly been transmitted through performance art, including the
spoken word.
For her research, Jallow collected folk tales from East African
villages. "Nearly everywhere I went people had no recollection
of their own stories, and the generation who used to tell these
stories are now in their 80s," she told Reuters.
"For me it was really important to see how we preserve not only
the stories but in particular the culture of telling (them)."
With nods to giants of African culture such as Thomas Sankara
and Fela Kuti, those narrated in Nairobi addressed issues common
to African societies, ranging from war and materialism to
humility and respect for children, often with a contemporary
twist.
For Alim Kamara, a rapper from Sierra Leone who grew up in
London, storytelling has never been more relevant or topical.
"There's a story about truth, and how truth knocked on people's
doors, and was always rejected and turned away," he told
Reuters.
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"One day, parable took truth home, and fed truth and clothed truth
in story. "Now truth... knocked on those people's doors and this
time was readily welcomed."
Accompanying some performances was Gambian kora (African harp)
player Sanjally Jobarteh, whose family has kept alive oral histories
for over seven centuries.
For Usifu Jalloh, from Sierra Leone, storytelling can help validate
existence. "When Africans were enslaved, and when invaders came in,
the first thing they did was wipe out the identity of the people
that they conquered and superimposed theirs on top," he said.
"When you know your story, you have a lot of power. When you forget
your story you are just like a sheep."
So why don't chickens fly? Because chicken squandered all the wealth
given to him as king of the sky. When the other birds found out, he
was banished from the air and became man's favorite food.
(Editing by Elias Biryabarema; editing by John Stonestreet)
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